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Ever felt like your baby cries more than anyone else’s in the world? Well, if you’re Canadian, your suspicions might be true. A new meta-analysis from The Journal of Pediatrics has found that Canadian babies crymore than infants from just about every other country.

Psychologists in the UK set out to find how much babies really cry and, in doing so, ended up finding some major differences in infants across the globe. When they reviewed crying rates of about 8,700 babies, they found that, for the first six weeks of life, the average time for a baby to fuss or cry each day is 117 to 133 minutes; by the time a little one reaches 10 to 12 weeks, that number tends to drop to about 68 minutes. But, if you’re a parent in Canada, you can expect to hear about 150 daily minutes of crying at three to four weeks of life. The only babies with more powerful lungs live in the Netherlands, where parents hear a half-minute more fussing a day. German parents, on the other hand, are blessed with an average of just 80 noisy minutes.

Colic, which is generally diagnosed when an infant cries for three or more hours a day for at least three days a week, was also significantly higher for Canadian babies. While lucky parents in Denmark and Germany had colic rates around six percent at three to four weeks of age, we suffer from a whopping 34 percent colic rate at the same stage of life.

Though the study authors say they can “only speculate” on the reasons why there are country differences, the Canadian parenting experts at Today’s Parent hazarded a few guesses.

Here’s why we think Canadian babies cry so much:

They keep getting “Please play again” on their Rrroll Up the Rim to Win cup.

They just looked outside and saw we still have snow in April. April!

They realized they’ll never have enough money to buy a house in any of our major cities.

They just Googled the American-Canadian exchange rate.

They’re still upset that Drake was snubbed at the Junos.

They tried to make a recipe but realized one of the ingredients was only available at Trader Joe’s.

Last week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau released his 2017 federal budget. With it came the news of an extension to our already pretty dreamy parental benefits in Canada—at least compared to the mere 12 weeks our neighbours to the south get (if they’re lucky). As Americans looked longingly at our generous mat leaves, many Canadians rejoiced. Eighteen months off! A protected job! Because it’s 2017, right?!

But take a closer look and this proposal isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Right now, eligible parents are entitled to up to 35 weeks of parental leave, on top of the 15 weeks of maternity leave new moms can take. You get 55 percent of your income, up to a maximum of $51,300 (this amount increases slightly each year). With the new proposed 18-month parental leave, you’ll instead get 33 percent over 18 months instead of 12.

Same same? Nope. Let’s do some number crunching: Say you want to take your 15 weeks of maternity leave and all 35 weeks of parental leave, and let’s say that pre-baby, you earned more than $51,300. At the end of your 12-month mat leave you’d collect about $27,150, or about $2,263 per month. Under the new 18-month plan, you’d collect about $24,450, or about $1,358 per month.

One of the big “Justin-fications” for this proposal is that it’ll help parents deal with expensive and hard-to-find childcare, which is often cheaper and easier to find for toddlers (partly because staff-to-child ratios are looser after 18 months, so daycares are less inclined to hire additional staff to accommodate more infants). If parents can stay home with their kids until they’re 18 months, they could end up finding daycare more easily—and paying less for it.

In a city like Toronto, where daycare costs are the highest in the country, that might make some sense. But if you look at the 2016 childcare cost survey by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, that’s not the case across the country. In Toronto, the median cost for infant daycare is $1,649 per month. For toddlers, it’s $1,375. In Vancouver, however, infant daycare is about $1,321, while the median toddler rate is actually four dollars more. At my daughter’s daycare in Vancouver, the cost is the same for any kid between one and five. In Ottawa, toddler care costs $84 more.

On average, across the country, toddler care is about $107 cheaper than infant care. So if you take 18 months of parental leave and hold off on daycare until 18 months, you’ll save about $642. But you’ll also miss out on up to $2,700 of parental leave benefits.

As for the accessibility of infant spots, I can only speak anecdotally. In Vancouver, I put myself on multiple wait lists that I never heard a peep from, and created a spreadsheet of nearby group centres and licensed in-home daycares. I called them relentlessly for months. As the end of my 12-month mat leave drew closer, I started to panic. Three weeks before I was scheduled to start working again, I was offered three different full-time spots. I took one.

I hear that story a lot: You search and search and at the eleventh hour, you find a daycare. I don’t know a single parent who has been unable to find something.

That last-minute panic is one of the challenges with the new 18-month option. Although the details are still unclear (the budget is expected to pass in the House of Commons, but we may not see these changes enacted until next year), it’s likely that you’ll be required to choose between a 12-month leave or an 18-month leave at the outset, when you first make your claim right after your baby is born. If you choose 18 months but then decide you want to go back to work sooner, you’ll be missing out on the higher benefit rate. If you plan to return to work after 12 months and at 11.5 months you realize you still don’t have daycare arranged, you probably won’t be able to extend your benefits at that point because you’ve already been claiming benefits at the higher, shorter-term 55 percent rate.

Financially, you’d actually be better off taking 12 months at 55 percent and then six months off completely unpaid—that’s just the math. But taking that kind of time off from your career is a luxury few have, especially if it comes at a cost. Even with job protection (which will be extended along with the benefits), 18 months away from your career could prove risky in terms of skill development, opportunities for advancement, department or company restructuring or even just your mat leave replacement getting chummy with your boss. A lot can change in a year and a half. Plus, many parents don’t want to stay home for a full 18 months.

To suggest that parents take more time off to address systemic childcare woes is just passing the buck. If the government truly wants to fix some of the problems with daycare in Canada, maybe they can start with, um, fixing the problems with daycare in Canada. Costs are skyrocketing (especially once you factor in the cost of childcare for a second or third kid). The final months of mat leave or pat leave are often spent in a frenzy trying to secure a daycare spot, and families are put in the difficult position of choosing any daycare that will take them—licensed or not—at a time that’s already pretty emotional for some parents as they transition back to work.

What would really help is an increase to the maximum insurable earnings. If the government is on board with lower benefits over a longer period, how about also offering higher benefits over a shorter period? Give me 75 percent for six months. Fix daycare the right way: by creating more spots and by subsidizing costs for daycares and families.

In British Columbia, a childcare advocacy group is pushing for $10-a-day daycare, a plan the B.C. NDP has embraced in the lead-up to the provincial election this spring. This is modelled after Quebec, where affordable, subsidized daycare was implemented 12 years ago. Advocates argue that subsidized daycare pays for itself (and is better for the economy): More women are able to enter or re-enter the workforce, increasing families’ purchasing power and the amount of taxes paid.

Choice is good. Choice is empowering. And I think it’s great that women may soon have the chance to choosea longer parental leave if it works for them, and that we’ll have the backing of the federal government to make that decision. But it’s not really a choice if you simply can’t afford it—financially, professionally or emotionally. For example, how could a single-parent household survive on $24,450 for 18 months?! Under the guise of Canada’s first gender-sensitive budget, our self-proclaimed feminist prime minister is essentially asking women and families to shoulder more burden for less payoff, for longer.

There are plenty of reasons to make sure your kids get tons of exercise: Among others, they’ll enjoy strong muscles and a healthy weight—and you’ll avoid bedtime antics. But now, there’s another incentive: New research published in the online journal Pediatrics shows that engaging in physical activity can prevent depression in kids.

The Canadian analysis of multiple studies involving almost 90,000 healthy kids from ages eight to 19 found that those who were physically active more often—especially those who did vigorous activities, like dancing or playing tag—reported experiencing fewer signs of depression.

Though we don’t often think of mental illness affecting kids, one to two percent of children under the age of 12 and five to eight percent of adolescents will struggle with depression. But getting moving can offer a mental health boost, preventing or delaying depressive symptoms, says one of the study’s authors, Daphne Korczak, a psychiatrist at SickKids hospital and the director of the Children’s Integrated Mood and Body Depression Program.

Even just delaying the onset of depression in kids who might eventually develop it could be important because those who develop the illness earlier in life typically experience more severe problems, says Korczak. “The childhood years are formative,” she says. “Academically, they set kids up for the future, and socially, [they impact] the ability to navigate interpersonal relationships. So if you have a disabling condition that affects you in those years, the outcome of that and the effects on the developing brainmay potentially be more significant.”

Interestingly, though kids who were active felt fewer symptoms of depression, getting moving didn’t necessarily prevent kids from eventually being diagnosed with major depressive disorder, something Korczak says could indicate that some children—like those at risk for more severe, syndromal-level depression—might not respond as well to exercise. “Activity is not the only factor,” she notes.

Even if your kid seems like a little ray of sunshine right now, it’s a good idea to get them moving early on, because preventing depression in kids before it begins is key. Canadian guidelines suggest that kids ages five to 17 should be getting 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity a day, but according to the Canadian Paediatric Society, just seven percent of Canadian youth are moving for an hour six or more days a week. And participation in sports is on the decline.

When it comes to getting kids moving, Korczak says the key is to doing activities your kids get excited about. “The most important thing is to find something that’s enjoyable so that the enjoyment becomes associated with the activity and it doesn’t become a chore.”

Our friends at Chatelaine just did a massive survey of 1,000 Canadian women between the ages of 35 and 45. They asked them a ton of questions, but the one we were most interested in was the top source of mom guilt. Can you guess what it is?

Half of women feel guilty about the amount of screen time their kids are getting. Whether or not this is your top source of mom guilt, I’m sure you’ve worried about how much time your kid spends watching PAW Patrol or felt shamed for letting your kid play with your phone while at a restaurant. But with the evolving world of technology and digital gadgets, it’s nearly impossible not to let your kid have some screen time.

The good news is it’s time to stop feeling so guilty because in October 2016, The American Academy of Pediatrics released a new set of recommendations for family screen time that acknowledges how technology is inevitable in the home—so you don’t have to burn all your gadgets. The amount of screen time varies depending on the age of your child, but the AAP recommends that whatever your kids are doing on the phone or TV, you should be doing it right along with them. Why? Because parents can help their kids “understand what they’re seeing and how to integrate that into their real-world experience.” So you really don’t have to feel too bad about your kid’s screen time. But you do have to watch PAW Patrol with them. Sorry!

Screen time was only one of many things women felt mom guilt over. Twenty-five percent of moms are ashamed of their children’s fast food intake. The struggle is real when it comes to getting a homemade dinner on the table! We totally “cheat” sometimes and use these healthy packaged foodsthat make getting supper on the table a total breeze. The survey also says that a quarter of of moms think they let their kids eat too much sugar. Yep, we feel that one too. Have you read about this family who gave up sugar?

Maggie MacDonnell had taught in Botswana, Tanzania and Congo, but had never seen anything like what she experienced in Salluit, Que., when she began teaching there six years ago.

“The memory that continues to haunt me is when I see these Canadian teenagers, their very own classmates of the deceased, literally digging the grave,” she said in an interview. “I didn’t know until I came to Salluit that that was a Canadian reality.”

Drug use and alcoholism rates are high in Salluit. The tiny Inuit community witnessed six suicides in 2015, all involving males between the ages of 18 and 25.

MacDonnell, a native of tiny Afton, N.S, won the $1-million Global Teacher Prize Sunday, probably the world’s most-coveted and high-profile award for teaching excellence. She was awarded the prize during a ceremony in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, beating out about 20,000 applicants from around the world.

The prize was established three years ago to recognize one exceptional teacher a year who has made an outstanding contribution to the profession, employs innovative classroom practices and encourages others to join the teaching profession.

“You have done extraordinary things in exceptional circumstances and have showed enormous heart, will and imagination,” said Trudeau, a former teacher himself.

Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard, Governor General David Johnston, and astronaut Chris Hadfield all took to social media to congratulate the teacher.

Maggie MacDonnell accepted the award alongside one of her students. Photo: The Canadian Press

Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum was on hand to present the prize to MacDonnell. Her name was announced by French astronaut Thomas Pasquet in a video message from the International Space Station.

MacDonnell was among 10 finalists flown to Dubai to attend the ceremony. The nine others hail from Pakistan, the U.K., Jamaica, Spain, Germany, China, Kenya, Australia and Brazil.

Last week, MacDonnell told the Canadian Press she was excited three of her students could make the trip to Dubai with her. “They’re a huge part of the story and the reason I chose to get involved (in the award) was to make sure it could in some way benefit their lives,” she said.

Along with teaching, MacDonnell became the community’s fitness co-ordinator—“I’m also a coach, I’m also a mentor, I’m a bit of a motivator. For some children, I’m also somewhat of a parental figure, and older sibling, and aunt and extra mother,” she told the CBC.

Some 1,860 kilometres north of Montreal, Salluit is home to the second northernmost Inuit indigenous community in Quebec, with a population of just over 1,300, and can only be reached by air.

Her determination to stay in the remote area, where many teachers leave their post midway through the year, made her a standout for the award. Still, she was reluctant to join the contest—until a friend told her it would draw attention to the plight of children in the far north.

MacDonnell created a number of programs for boys and girls, including job mentorship and funds to assist with healthy meals. Her approach focuses on emphasizing “acts of kindness” such as running a community kitchen and attending suicide prevention training.

She said that if she won, she wanted to start an environmental stewardship program for northern youth, focused on kayaking.

“I can’t say it’s going after the root issues—physical activity isn’t the solution to the housing crisis, it isn’t a solution to the food security those kids are facing in the north,” said MacDonnell in an interview last week.

“But it is a tool to building resilience and it’s a really great coping strategy for them to have considering all that they’re dealing with.”

Last year, Palestinian teacher Hanan al-Hroub won for her efforts in encouraging students to renounce violence and embrace dialogue. The inaugural prize went to Nancie Atwell, an English teacher from Maine.

The award is presented by the Varkey Foundation. Its founder, Sunny Varkey, established the for-profit GEMS Education company, which has more than 250 schools around the world.

I walked up the snow-covered steps of a quaint bungalow, excited to meet a two-month-old little boy and his mama. She had sent me an email a few days prior; all it said was, “I need help with my baby, he’s crying all the time. Can you do anything?” This is common story in my inbox. I replied I could be there Wednesday.

I knocked on her door, and a beautiful thirty-something woman answered, bouncing a bundle. We sat down on her couch and started to chat. She said he’d been born on his due date, a beautiful delivery, and she was back at home 24 hours later. Breastfeeding hurt in the hospital, but she was told that was “normal” and it would get better. A week later, still trying to “push through”, she couldn’t take it any longer, and went to her local breastfeeding clinic. Her little man had a tongue tie, they said, a common reason for breastfeeding pain. The physician clipped the tongue tie in the office and sent her home with instructions on how to move forward. She continued “pushing on” and did feel some relief, but continued to struggle with supply and latch issues. She was back and forth between clinics and private consultants, as she was desperate to breastfeed. She had dreamed of nursing her baby, like many moms, and the journey had consumed their household. She could not get a comfortable latch no matter what she tried or whose help she enlisted. She was consumed with trying and not giving up. I watched this woman become more teary and shaky as her story progressed. She told me he was gaining weight, but was very fussy and cried at the breast and throughout most of the day and night. Her husband had taken the day off work to be home for our appointment and he sat quietly with his arm around his wife and babe.

I first told her she was doing a beautiful job with her son. I told her the best part of my morning so far was getting to witness the way she looked at him and that I could hear the efforts she had been putting in to try to establish pain-free breastfeeding and an ample supply. I acknowledged that her path sounded full of challenges and I asked her simply, “How are you feeling?”

She broke down. Sobbing in her living room, she told me that breastfeeding was a number one priority for her, and she had read all the books and had sought out so much help and support, but that she just couldn’t do it anymore. She went on to tell me that the stress of nursing had taken all the joy out of becoming parents and it was all both her and her husband could think about. I could see that this woman was full of anxiety and had some real red flags of depression. She shared that she cried alongside her baby throughout most of the day, and was starting to wonder how she was going to keep going. She wasn’t leaving the house and spent all day feeding and pumping.

“Do you want to keep breastfeeding?” I asked her. Both her and her husband looked at me in silence. I realized in this moment what this woman needed from me, a registered nurse and lactation consultant. She needed permission. I told her that the most important thing was that her baby felt loved and that as a mom she had the ability to nurture and care for her baby. I told her flat out, “It is okay to stop and give him a bottle of formula.”

She and her husband hugged and both started to cry. Minutes later, they said, “Thank you, we needed to hear that.”

This is such a controversial topic. #Fedisbest is flooding the internet, and there are so many varying opinions. As a lactation consultant, I am an advocate for breastfeeding, and will go the distance with any family to ensure it happens. But it is not up to anyone but that mother to decide when she has reached her limit. A mama’s mental health trumps breastfeeding. Every time. Breastmilk does not care for, nurture and bond with the baby. A mother does. I am not arguing the health benefits of breastfeeding. Those are known facts. I am talking about the part that just isn’t talked about enough: a mom’s mental health.

Last year, for a few days anyway, the whole country was talking about it. Suffering from postpartum depression, Vancouver mother Florence Leung ended her life two months after her baby was born. On her memorial Facebook page, her husband recently wrote the following:

“To all the new moms experiencing low mood or anxiety, please seek help and talk about your feelings. You are not alone. You are not a bad mother. Do not EVER feel bad or guilty about not being able to exclusively breastfeed.”

As you can guess, despite being an advocate for breastfeeding, I agree completely. Somewhere along the way, our well intentioned, health-benefit focused campaigns on breastfeeding have fueled the message of guilt, shame and pressure on moms that are struggling and it is time for that to change.

I recently received a card and photo in the mail from the mom who gave up breastfeeding after our visit. It was her guy’s one-year birthday. In the picture, I saw a healthy, thriving family. The note said that the day I gave her permission to stop breastfeeding was the day she felt a shift. The tears stopped. She started enjoying the little moments with her boy and their bond grew. She said she still has moments when she feels sad that she and her son missed out on the nursing experience, but she knows that stopping is what her family needed.

We need to stop arguing about what is better. Breastfeeding, formula, bottles, pumping. It isn’t something that is up to “us.” It is not social media’s business, your neighbour’s, your mother’s, or the business of that mom group you belong to. It is yours exclusively.

As much as I like #fedisbest, I think it should evolve into new movement: #momsmentalhealthmatters. A healthy mom is necessary for a healthy, thriving baby—and that is what matters.

Carrie Bruno is a registered nurse, lactation consultant and sleep coach who runs The Mama Coach in Calgary, Alberta. Some details of this story have been changed to protect the family’s privacy.

Many parents of kids with late birthdays consider redshirting Kindergarten—and now, the nation’s largest school board is saying that they just may be right to do so. The concept of redshirting is this: if your child has a late-month birthday, they may be better off starting school an entire year late, thus making them one of the oldest kids in the class, versus the youngest, and therefore more ready to enter Kindergarten. (The term “redshirting” is borrowed from U.S. college sports, for a student-athlete who foregoes her first year on the field or court in lieu of an extra season of eligibility later on, when she’s older and stronger and more skilled.)

The Toronto District School Board (TDSB) has just released new data showing the distinct advantages of redshirting kindergarten for kids with birthdays in the last three months of the year, noting that these children experience troubles with the emotional strength and maturity necessary for success at school at more than twice the rate of kids born in the first three months of the year. The data also show lopsided numbers on elements such as language and cognitive development, communication skills and general knowledge, and physical health and well being—with early-month children always performing much better than their younger peers.

Dr. Charles Ungerleider adds that the TDSB findings are consistent with other studies. “The literature seems to suggest that it’s advantageous to hold your child back from entering school if they would be young in relation to their peers—and that’s particularly true for boys,” says the professor emeritus at the University of British Columbia and former B.C. deputy minister of education. “I’d certainly advise parents to pay attention to the body of evidence.”

The TDSB data show that the gap remains relatively wide into Grade 3 and persists into Grade 6. In the United States, as many as nine percent of parents now redshirt their children, and in Alberta, where schedules and curriculum are more flexible, some school boards have begun pushing back overall enrolment age in order to respond to the trend.

For their part, the TDSB is reminding principals to tell parents whose kids have late birthdays that they’re free to enroll later—while Kindergarten is voluntary, Ontario’s Education Act states that if a child’s birthday falls after the first day of the school year, he can begin Grade 1 the following year.

Other studies have been far less conclusive on the long-term benefits of redshirting—and the TDSB’s own data show that the gap vanishes by high school. There are plenty of other factors for parents to weigh as well:

Too far aheadAnd, while it may seem counterintuitive, some have suggested that older kids may actually be bored in a class of younger peers, and fail to develop proper study skills. In addition, many Canadian provinces employ a play-based approach to Kindergarten—making it easier for young ones to catch up.

Friends and social lifeDr. Ungerleider also encourages parents to consider the social impacts of holding their kids back. “Friendship patterns are important,” he says, noting that disrupting these (if a child has playmates before school but won’t be entering the class at the same time as them) can have a negative impact on them socially as well as academically, especially if they get the idea that they’re somehow lacking in areas that their friends are not. “That’s not a message you want to send.”

CostWith daycare costs for preschoolers an average of $1,033 a month, many parents are willing to roll the dice that their younger kindergartener will keep up with peers in order to avoid paying for yet another year of full-time childcare.

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